THE WARMASTER Read online

  Gaunt sat down, and gestured for Rawne to sit too.

  ‘How has Felyx taken it?’ he asked.

  ‘Rough,’ said Rawne. ‘Like you’d expect. Criid’s taken him under her wing. Apparently, that was your woman’s dying wish, and I approved it. She’s got Dalin to keep an eye on Felyx. Keep things as normal as possible. Guard routine.’

  ‘That’s good. I suppose I’ll have to talk to him.’

  ‘Well, he’s kind of your son and everything. And he wants a funeral.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘No, he wants to pay for a private funeral. The works.’

  ‘Not appropriate.’

  ‘Oh, let him do it. Maddalena was a mother figure to him. It’s the House Chass way, and he’s rich as feth. Let him do it and save yourself some grief.’

  Gaunt didn’t reply.

  ‘Save Felyx some grief,’ Rawne added. ‘Let him feel like he’s done something.’

  Gaunt nodded.

  ‘I have to go back to the palace this afternoon. I’m needed at staff. There’s a mass of tactical data to go through. This war’s a mess.’

  ‘It’s a war. When weren’t they a mess?’

  ‘We’re probably going to have to consider changes, Eli.’

  ‘Changes?’

  ‘In regimental structure. We’re special status now. I have Tempestus goons trailing me around.’

  ‘They’re right outside the door and can probably hear you,’ said Rawne.

  ‘I don’t particularly care. Anyway, this new rank elevates me too far above the regiment structure. The divide is too great. I’ll need to promote from within.’

  ‘Promote?’

  ‘There needs to be a colonel in charge, especially if I’m not present, which I’m not going to be as much as I’d like.’

  ‘Gol, Bask and I handle the regiment well enough when you’re not around.’

  ‘Not doubting that, but the Munitorum will insist for appearances and formal process. I’ll have to raise one of you, or they’ll bring someone in from outside.’

  ‘Really?’ asked Rawne, his face not relishing that prospect.

  Gaunt smiled.

  ‘It’ll be one of you three. Well, I guess Daur, Elam and Pasha are in the frame too, but really it’s one of you three. Ironic. One Tanith, one Verghast, one Belladon.’

  Rawne nodded.

  ‘It should be Gol,’ he said.

  Gaunt looked surprised.

  ‘I’m asking you, Eli.’

  ‘To be colonel? Colonel Rawne? I don’t think so. Gol’s the better man.’

  ‘Gol’s one of the best men I’ve ever served with. But it should be a Tanith because of this regiment’s history and name, and it should be you because of your service.’

  Rawne sat back and shrugged.

  ‘Here’s my thinking,’ he said. ‘You told me that staff promoted you for your service record, chief amongst the honours of which is Vervunhive. The People’s Hero. If this is about appearances and show, then the hard-arse Verghast scratch company hero is the one for you. It’s kind of poetic. The People’s Hero and his doughty partisan second. Plus, and again for show, Gol was… like… blessed by the fething Beati and brought back from living death, so he’s probably got feth-arse sainthood in his future somewhere.’

  ‘She’s here, you know?’ said Gaunt. ‘Here on Urdesh.’

  ‘So I understand.’

  Rawne put his hands flat on the tabletop.

  ‘I don’t want to be a fething colonel,’ he said. ‘Kolea’s the man you want. We all have authority, true enough. Mine comes from… Well, people fear me. They love Bask. That’s where his authority comes from. Gol… He commands through respect. Everybody respects him. Everybody. He’s the one you want. Plus, he’s never tried to kill you or sworn eternal vengeance against you or anything. I don’t want to be a fething colonel. I’d never be able to look the woods of Tanith in the face again… oh, wait.’

  He glared at Gaunt.

  Gaunt laughed.

  ‘And besides,’ said Rawne, ‘I could never ever take Corbec’s place. Not ever.’

  Gaunt nodded.

  ‘We’ll talk about this again,’ he said.

  ‘We fething won’t,’ said Rawne. ‘It’s a done fething deal, my lord militant commander.’

  They sat together on a broken wall behind the billets, looking out across the rubble wastes.

  ‘How long have you been–’ Dalin said finally.

  ‘A girl? Are you a simpleton? All my life.’

  ‘Hiding this, I was going to say.’

  Felyx shrugged.

  ‘Since Verghast. Since birth.’

  ‘Who knows?’

  ‘Maddalena knew. Ludd knows.’

  ‘Ludd?’

  ‘Yes, “Ludd”,’ she mocked.

  ‘Why does Ludd know?’

  ‘Pretty much the same reason you do. He found out by accident. Maddalena went to great lengths to always secure me a private room. When the Armaduke fell out of the warp, I was alone, getting in kit for secondary order, and I was knocked unconscious. He found me.’

  ‘And he saw–’

  ‘Yes, he saw.’

  ‘So that’s why he–’

  ‘Yes, that’s why. That’s why he wanted me to be placed in his care, to protect my secret. But he couldn’t say so. And your damn mother–’

  ‘Was doing what Maddalena asked. And trying to help you.’

  Felyx shrugged.

  ‘Doesn’t it hurt?’ Dalin asked.

  ‘Doesn’t what hurt?’

  ‘The binding you put around your body, squashing up your–’

  ‘My?’

  ‘Your… bosom.’

  ‘They’re called breasts, Dalin. Grow up.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘You get used to it,’ she added.

  ‘Why?’ asked Dalin. He picked up a stone from the wall top and tossed it across the rubble. ‘Why hide it? Why the secret? There are women in this regiment…’

  ‘My mother,’ she said, ‘is heir to House Chass of Vervunhive-Verghast. You’re Verghastite, Criid. You know this.’

  ‘A bit. I was very young when I left. And I’m low-hive scum, right? So the politics of your world are lost on me.’

  ‘My world is your world,’ she said.

  ‘Not really. My world is the regiment. For me, Verghast means the regiment.’

  Felyx pondered this. She looked out across the rubble flats. The pink dawn was turning to a drab, overcast day, a scurfy, grey expanse of sky. An interceptor, probably a Lightning, soared across the distance, east to west, low over the city, leaving a long, rolling whoosh behind it.

  ‘My mother is heir apparent to House Chass,’ she said. ‘House Chass is the most powerful of the Vervunhive controlling dynasties. She is the only heir. No sons. The first female ever to hold that rank. She must inherit the full title when my grandfather dies.’

  Felyx paused.

  ‘Time has passed. He is probably dead already.’

  She shrugged.

  ‘Anyway, the hive elders are against a female succession to House rule, and the other noble families… they see an opportunity to undermine House Chass and loosen its grip on the reins of power. Vervunhive-Verghast is a patriarchy, Criid. The Houses all have strong male heads or heirs. If my mother succeeds, she will be deemed weak – it will be a moment to topple House Chass from its long dominance. House Anko, House Sondar, House Jehnik… Throne, they will fight hard. It will be a dynastic war that could collapse Vervunhive more thoroughly than Heritor gakking Asphodel’s Zoican War ever did.’

  She glanced sideways at Dalin. He was listening, frowning.

  ‘My mother is persistent and ambitious. Very ambitious. She cites continuity of bloodline, and her connection to the People’s Hero who saved the hive from doom. She may carry the popular vote, despite her sex. Now, the city knows she has a child by Gaunt, the offspring of the hive saviour. So, in the absence of a direct male heir, the most elegant compromise t
o effect a popular succession would be to skip a generation. To make the child the new lord. For my mother to step aside, and become the Lady Dowager. For the son to succeed. That would be a big deal. It would strengthen House Chass’ hold on power immensely. For Vervunhive to inherit a ruler who is both House Chass and the bloodline of the People’s Hero.’

  ‘But no one knows that child is a girl?’

  ‘No one,’ she said.

  Away in the distance, in the direction of Zarakppan, the muffled thump of an artillery bombardment or a saturation bombing began to roll, like faraway thunder or the quiver of heavy metal sheets. A smudge of black smoke smeared the horizon.

  ‘My mother is ambitious,’ said Felyx. ‘She wants power for herself. And she can’t accede to the demands to step aside anyway, because that means admitting her child is another female. So she sent me away.’

  ‘Just like that?’

  ‘You really don’t understand hive politics, do you? By sending me away, my mother makes herself the only candidate for succession. She avoids the issue of standing aside, and secures absolute primogeniture, which suits her ambition, no matter the political fight that might present to her. If I had stayed, the issue of my succession would have become a focus, and my gender would have been revealed. It would have weakened House Chass even more. There would have been no advantage to skipping, and there would have been, further, the prospect of an all-female succession. A woman followed by a woman. That would be too much for the traditionalists to bear. House Chass would have been done, then and there.’

  ‘So she sent you away?’

  ‘She sent me away.’

  ‘So she could become queen?’

  ‘It’s not a queen. It’s… head of the House.’

  ‘She doesn’t sound like a very nice woman,’ said Dalin.

  ‘She’s not. She’s a political animal. I respect her and loathe her for that in equal measure. I honestly wanted to find my father. I thought he’d be the better parent.’

  ‘And he’s not?’

  ‘How do you think he’s doing so far?’

  Dalin swung his feet and shrugged.

  ‘He’s a great man.’

  ‘He’s a great soldier,’ said Felyx. ‘He’s no father. Except, ironically, to the Ghosts.’

  Dalin ran his tongue around his teeth and thought for a moment.

  ‘We should tell him,’ he said.

  ‘No!’

  ‘My mother, then?’

  ‘Are you trying to be stupid?’

  ‘Then Doctor Curth. Curth can be trusted. Doesn’t she even know?’

  ‘I have studiously avoided all medicae exams,’ she said. She paused. ‘The prospect of lice is a worry.’

  ‘You’re on the front line. What if you’re injured? They’ll find out. That’s no way to find out!’

  ‘You will keep my secret, Dalin Criid. You will swear this to me.’

  She looked at him fiercely. She was not asking. It was the look of a person who had been raised to expect complete obedience.

  ‘Look,’ he said. ‘Verghast high echelon may be a misogynistic mess… which, I have to say, comes as a surprise given how many female soldiers it has raised. Like my mother.’

  ‘By necessity,’ she scoffed, ‘and because it is the only sphere of power in which a Verghastite woman may flourish. The war allowed women to show their strength. It is an empowering moment against the traditional patriarchy that my dear mother is using to the full extent to secure her position. It also factored into her decision regarding me. If I was sent out after my illustrious father, and served with him, and won rank and glory, then I could return and succeed her, and it wouldn’t matter if I was a man or a woman. Because glory in war is a currency that all Verghastites understand. So she had the juvenaticists accelerate my growth and packed me off.’

  In the distance, the thunder of the bombing had grown more intense.

  ‘My point is,’ said Dalin, ‘you don’t need to hide here. The Ghosts will accept you for who you are. There’ll be no prejudice like there is in your home hive.’

  ‘Word would get back to Verghast, and that would undermine her carefully laid plans,’ Felyx said.

  ‘I think you should tell someone,’ he said.

  ‘I think you should tell no one,’ she replied.

  There was silence between them for a while.

  ‘What do I call you?’ he asked.

  ‘Felyx,’ she said. ‘Or Chass, as you do.’

  ‘What’s your real name?’

  ‘Meritous Felyx Chass. Merity Chass. After my mother. But my name is employed artfully to disguise the gender.’

  Dalin heard someone behind him. He turned sharply.

  ‘What are you doing out here, Dal?’ asked Yoncy.

  ‘Yoncy!’ Dalin jumped down off the wall.

  Yoncy scratched at her bald scalp. She looked thinner and older without the little girl pigtails. Her smock dress seemed more like the tunic of a prepubescent boy. She looked awkward, but oddly more beautiful than she had done as a pig-tailed child.

  ‘Mumma cut my hair off, Dal,’ she said.

  ‘How long has she been there?’ Felyx asked, jumping off the wall in alarm.

  ‘She cut my hair off because of the lice,’ said Yoncy. ‘The itchy lice. She cut off all my tails.’

  ‘How long has she been there?’ Felyx repeated. ‘What did she hear? Dalin?’

  ‘What were you talking about?’ Yoncy asked.

  ‘Oh, just things,’ said Dalin.

  ‘Were you talking about Papa Gaunt?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Felyx, warily.

  ‘He is milignant commander now,’ she said. ‘They said so.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Felyx. ‘My great father, greater by the hour.’

  Yoncy cocked her starkly shaved head, and looked at Felyx with big eyes.

  ‘He’s your papa too? Papa Gaunt is?’

  ‘He’s my father, yes.’

  Yoncy frowned and thought.

  ‘What else were you talking about?’ she asked. ‘Who’s Merity?’

  Laksheema led them through to the large workspaces adjoining her panelled office. Grae followed. The workspaces were several joined chambers, lined with examination benches over which hung glass projection screens. Ordo tech-savants bowed to Laksheema, before turning back to their diligent examinations.

  Laksheema had brought a small silver cyberskull from her desk. She set it, and then released it into the air as if she were letting slip a dove. It rose and hovered over her shoulder. They all immediately felt a slight prickling sensation. The drone was generating a clandestine jamming field around them.

  ‘The stones are the chief items of interest,’ said Laksheema. She clicked an actuator wand, and images of the stones appeared on the hanging protection plates. Close up views, both back and front, in high resolution. Domor looked at them and shuddered.

  ‘I understand the asset thought these especially significant?’ she said.

  ‘That’s my understanding,’ said Fazekiel.

  ‘Did he say why?’

  ‘Neither Fazekiel nor I were present at the time of recovery,’ said Baskevyl.

  ‘I was,’ said Domor. ‘I was part of Strike Beta that went in with Gaunt, and made the recovery. We went into that foul fething place. It was like animals lived there, but Mabbon, he called it a college.’

  ‘Mabbon?’ asked Grae.

  ‘The “asset”,’ Domor replied, surly.

  ‘What else did he say?’ asked Laksheema.

  Domor shrugged.

  ‘I don’t know. We were under constant fire, and I was too busy shovelling this shit into carry-boxes. We all were. I wasn’t really listening.’

  Fazekiel pulled out a data-slate and consulted it.

  ‘The record states that the area was a “college of heritence”, a weapons lab, run – according to the asset – by the Anarch’s magir hapteka, or weaponwrights. All the material was said to be inert. That is to say, not actively tainted.
’

  ‘You had the asset’s word on that?’ asked Laksheema, dubiously.

  ‘There were compelling reasons to believe it so,’ Fazekiel said. ‘More volatile, warped material was held in other areas.’

  ‘A college of heritence,’ Grae said.

  ‘For weapons development,’ Fazekiel said, reading from her thorough notes. ‘One of many facilities constructed by Heritor Asphodel to supply war machines to the Anarch.’

  ‘Asphodel, the insane genius,’ mused Laksheema. ‘Very probably a corrupted adept of the Mechanicum, possibly immensely old, sharing Mechanicum perverted secrets with the enemy.’

  ‘That supposition is probably not cobalt-rated, ma’am,’ said Grae.

  ‘The drone hasn’t blocked it,’ she replied, glancing at the cyberskull hovering nearby. ‘However, if I had said, in addition, that Asphodel is reckoned to be–’

  Her mouth continued moving, but they could no longer hear her speaking. A faint buzzing from the cyberskull was blocking her words, redacting the classified information. Grae was nodding. He could hear her.

  ‘Yes,’ he said with a shudder, ‘that’s definitely vermilion clearance.’

  Baskevyl, Domor and Fazekiel glanced at one another.

  ‘Asphodel, curse his soul, is dead,’ said Domor. ‘Long dead, on Verghast. Colonel-Commissar Gaunt killed him. I mean… Militant Commander Gaunt.’

  ‘The asset suggested that Asphodel was just one of many “heritors” working for the enemy,’ said Fazekiel. ‘The greatest, perhaps, but one of many. A cult of demented weaponwrights, presumably “inheriting” secrets from the Mechanicum, to follow your line of thought.’

  ‘I am already fully aware of those theories,’ said Laksheema curtly. ‘I want to know details of your regiment’s experience at the point of collection. What did the asset say about the place and these stones?’

  ‘According to Gaunt’s verbatim report,’ said Fazekiel, returning to her transcript, ‘the asset called them the Glyptothek. A “library in stone”. He remembered them being brought to the Reach years before, and being treated as valuable even then. They were said to be xenos items of significance, recovered from one of the Khan Worlds. He wanted them collected, and considered them very important. He didn’t know why, he just appreciated their significance, the significance the weaponwrights considered them to have. He considered them “a discovery of singular value”.’